


I Come With Knives (To Love You)

by SuddenlySullen



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types
Genre: Cutting, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Inappropriate Use of the Force, Knifeplay, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-14
Updated: 2020-03-14
Packaged: 2021-03-01 03:13:28
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,220
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23138242
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SuddenlySullen/pseuds/SuddenlySullen
Summary: Kylo drops his forehead against Hux's. His voice drops to a whisper even though they are entirely alone. "Is it the scars? I miss them too. I don't feel like myself. Sometimes I hate this body so much I think about putting them all back. I'm not brave enough to do it myself. I thought you would prefer me like this."
Relationships: Armitage Hux/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Comments: 6
Kudos: 44





	I Come With Knives (To Love You)

It's a slow transition, from commanding the First Order to taking on occasional bounties for survival. At first, there is no time to dwell on how things might have been in another universe. Months on, though, Hux finds himself feeling like he's lost a part of Kylo and maybe a bit of himself along with it. They share a bed, but now it feels economic, rather than indulgent. 

Kylo kisses him one night and it is nauseatingly soft. He gives in all the wrong places. When Hux pushes, there is no push back. It reminds Hux of the first time he kissed a girl. She was curves and softness in a way that made him sick, no matter how badly his brain wanted him to want it. Afterward, he'd scrubbed his skin raw and run the fresher til the water went cold. He doesn't have that option now. One night Kylo tries to push. He chases Hux's lips when he pulls away, drops a hand between them to palm at the front of his pants, only to find that Hux is limp in his briefs. He yanks his hand away like it's been burned.

"I'm sorry," Hux tells him. He thinks about trying to explain how he feels. The emptiness inside him where the Kylo he knew used to elbow his way in. The spots that were carved out of him just so that this new Kylo doesn't quite fit in.

He doesn't have to explain. The devastated look on Kylo's face tells him that his thoughts were loud enough to be heard. Hux trails one hand down the side of Kylo's face. Kylo squirms, knowing that Hux isn't happy with what he sees. 

"It's still me," Kylo whispers. 

Hux shakes his head slightly on the pillow. "Not all of you. You left something in that room." 

"I don't understand," Kylo pleads. There's a bubbling wetness threatening to spill from his eyes. "After everything we fought for. You don't want me." 

"Oh, Kylo." Hux traces down the space of his cheek where Kylo's scar used to be. "I always wanted you. Just as you were." 

Kylo drops his forehead against Hux's. His voice drops to a whisper even though they are entirely alone. "Is it the scars? I miss them too. I don't feel like myself. Sometimes I hate this body so much I think about putting them all back. I'm not brave enough to do it myself. I thought you would prefer me like this." 

"I prefer  _ you _ , Kylo. This isn't you." 

"Would you help me?" Kylo is nuzzling at his face now. "If I put them back, would you help?"

"What are you asking me for, Kylo?" Hux's fingers tremble over his face. 

Kylo looks up through wet eyelashes. "Fix me." 

Hux reaches out for the knife he still keeps next to the bed. Old habits do die hard. Both he and Kylo sit up, suddenly very still. As he unsheathes it, he can feel Kylo tugging at his hand with the force, guiding him to the places he should be scarred. 

The first is his side, a wound that Hux remembers too well. The bolt from the Wookiee's blaster that pierced him. Kylo holds Hux's arm in position, seemingly waiting for him to close the distance between knife and flesh on his own. His eyes flick from Hux's face to the hand holding the knife with a look somewhere between terror and anticipation on his face.

"We will need the medkit," Hux says. "I will need to dress the wound."

Kylo stretches out a hand and moments later their first aid kit is rocketing into it. Hux is half tempted to scoff, but too busy revelling in what they're about to do. Perhaps what he's about to do to Kylo or what Kylo is going to use his body to do to himself. He presses the knife in, easier than he expects. He's not sure if he's sharpened it recently or if Kylo is helping his hand along. He thinks a bit of both. Once the knife is in, he twists the blade, carving out the wound. Kylo arches off the mattress, letting out a deep grunt of pain. Hux's free hand pets at his forehead.

When Hux pulls the knife free, he quickly replaces it with only a gauze wound dressing. No bacta. The bacta would prevent scarring and they don't want that. 

He takes the knife next to the other side of Kylo's ribs. His fingers rub along the spot where the scar of an old training accident should be. Goosebumps erupt across Kylo's skin. The knife moves in and he's sure this time that Kylo has pushed it along. He wasn't finished savoring the moment. It goes so much faster than Hux would have. He almost misses the way that Kylo twists and cries out at it. 

There are tears and snot streaming down Kylo's face. Hux hushes him as he carves out the next series of smaller cuts. They're precise, exactly where his scars are meant to be. Hux doesn't even bother dressing them before moving so that he's straddling Kylo's chest, pinning his arms down with his knees. He wipes away the tears, only from the side he needs. The rest he leaves, appreciating the look of Kylo while he falls apart. It gives him a bit of the edge that Hux misses about him.

When his hand moves, Hux knows the motion is his own. Kylo looks almost scared, pinned underneath him. It isn't quite fear though. Respect, maybe. Adoration, definitely. Hope, Hux thinks, is the other thing he sees in Kylo's eyes. Hope that once he's gotten his scars back he might be able to look in the mirror again. Otherwise, hope that Hux might be able to look at him again. Hux shares a bit of that hope. The knife splits the skin of Kylo's face easily, but Hux moves slow. He draws out the deep press of the blade into Kylo's face. When Kylo's muscles tense underneath him, it's the most like himself his body has felt since he came back to Hux. 

When the knife flies out of his hand, Hux thinks Kylo might be about to kill him. Instead, he's flipped off of Kylo and onto his back, where Kylo lays his head on his stomach and openly sobs. The wound on his face needs stitching. He's soaking Hux's shirt in blood. Neither of them can be bothered to care. 

"We did this," Kylo sniffles when he finds his voice. "When you pulled me out of the snow, the first time I got this scar. You held me." 

"You held me," Hux says, with no bite in his tone. His hand cards idly through Kylo's hair. "I thought you might kill me," he laughs softly. He's not sure if he's talking about then or now.

"Never," Kylo mumbles. "You were the only one that always saw me as I was."

"A disaster?" Hux teases gently, still aware of the blood soaking through his shirt to his skin. He feels sticky with it. 

"Sometimes. But you always saw me and you accepted me for what I was. What I am." 

"I couldn't very well toss you out the airlock, now could I?" Hux uses his hand in Kylo's hair to make him turn his head. He pulls the stitch tape from the first aid kit and starts applying it with gentle hands while they talk. He thinks about the way that Kylo sent a medical droid barrelling into the wall the first time he got this scar. Hux had eventually dressed that one too. 

"No one's stopping you now," Kylo prods back. 

"Oh it's too late for that now. You're mine," Hux's voice is firm and he means it when he says it. For as different as Kylo is, he's still Hux's. 

Kylo lets out a contented hum before settling himself into using Hux as a pillow. His adrenaline seems to be wearing off, eyelids sagging and muscles going slack. Hux thinks he should probably make Kylo get up and wash the blood off of them, but he can't find it in himself to move either. Instead, they sleep bathed in the blood of Kylo, not really Ren anymore, but certainly never Solo again. Just before he falls fully into sleep, Hux thinks of him briefly as Kylo Hux. He doesn't hate it as much as he thinks he should.

~ ~ ~ 

The scars heal almost the same as the originals. If Hux hadn't mapped every inch of Kylo, he thinks he might never be able to tell the difference. He wonders if someday this will be the only way he sees Kylo - like the way he only really remembers what Brendol looked like floating in a bacta tank as he wasted away. He thinks about the way the bloated, disintegrating body of his father haunts his nightmares and wonders if that's a good thing.

Kylo is easier to look at when he looks like himself. Though the brief glimpses of softness that Hux had seen only rarely in the past are still the constant presence in his bed. He tries to accustom himself to this gentled version of Kylo. The spaces Kylo carved out him slowly start to fill themselves in around this new Kylo. 

He often wakes with soft limbs tangled up in his own. The soft flesh of Kylo's muscles molds around his hard edges and in the warmest moments as he wakes he thinks maybe he can understand what people see in women. 

The first time Kylo kisses him again, they've just exited the atmosphere of a planet on the outer rim after claiming a bounty. It's a victory kiss that Kylo is leading, but he is somehow still so soft. Hux doesn't pull away. He refuses to let himself. He wants to want Kylo. He leans into the dizzying softness of Kylo's lips and lets himself get lost in it. 

He backs Kylo further into the ship and Kylo lets him. When they tumble onto their bed, Hux braces himself over Kylo. He looks down at the angry scar that crosses Kylo's face and thinks about the act of putting it there. He can't help but kiss a trail down the length of it. Something deep in his gut twists possessively as he's lifting Kylo's shirt. He thinks about every mark on Kylo's skin and how he's the only one that has put them there. With Kylo laid out beneath them, every blemish is on display and they all might as well be Hux's name for how much he feels ownership of them. 

Kylo's soft intake of breath startles Hux from his thoughts. When he looks up he sees the tears pooling at the edges of Kylo's eyes. He wonders if Kylo might have been listening to his thoughts.

"You used to look at me like that," Kylo mumbles. "Before." 

"Like what?" Hux asks, lips against Kylo's. 

Kylo whines. "Like you owned me." 

Hux growls and bites into Kylo's lower lip. "I do."

They pull apart just far enough for Hux to tug their pants off. A bottle of oil finds its way into Hux's hand from who-knows-where and he can't even be bothered to roll his eyes. He slicks himself in a few easy strokes and makes no effort to prepare Kylo. He wants it to hurt like the first time, when neither knew what to do and they'd rutted against each other like awkward, feral animals. 

When he slides into Kylo in one thrust, Kylo wails, but there is a push at Hux's back keeping him in place that he recognizes as Kylo using the force because words have failed him. He isn't sure it's even an intentional use and something about that makes it even better. 

They roll their hips together easily. Something about this softer Kylo makes it easier for Hux to thrust into him. Even the muscles inside of him feel softer where they part for Hux's cock. For every snap of his hips, Hux finds his gaze shifting from one scar to the next. Each one is a reminder that Kylo's body is his. The time spent without this kind of touch has Hux's orgasm sneaking up on him. He brings a hand to Kylo's cock to stroke him, but all it takes is the grip of his hand for Kylo to be whimpering and coming across his own chest. Hux fucks him through it, thumbing at the head until Kylo has tears streaming down his face from overstimulation. Only then does he let himself come buried inside Kylo's body. One more mark of ownership. 

When he's slipped free, Hux pulls Kylo over to lay his sweaty mop of dark hair on his chest. Their breathing eventually settles into an even rhythm. The blanket lifts up and covers them, dragged up by the force. It brings a slight smile to Hux's face. Soft limbs tangle into Hux's own, but the touch is a familiar one. Now, he thinks it reminds him more of a warm bath. He just wants to let himself float in it for a while. Hux keeps one hand in Kylo's hair even after he's fallen asleep. It feels indulgent and not at all economic.

**Author's Note:**

> Title is from the IAMX song by the same name


End file.
